


A Dozen Steps Down the Road

by Calliatra



Category: Grantchester (TV)
Genre: Drabble Sequence, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-22
Updated: 2016-09-22
Packaged: 2018-08-14 02:50:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7995862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calliatra/pseuds/Calliatra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How it begins.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Dozen Steps Down the Road

**Author's Note:**

  * For [trillingstar](https://archiveofourown.org/users/trillingstar/gifts).



 

_It begins long before it actually begins._

“I had a priest come in today. A vicar.”

Cathy raises her eyebrows.

“We’ve got a clear—” he checks for children, lowers his voice, “a clear suicide. Gun in his hand, note on the table, the whole lot. But this vicar thinks that’s too obvious. Says some mysterious anonymous source told him it’s murder.”

“And do you think he’s right?”

“I think he’s bored. Young fellow, probably tired of ministering to the old and faithful all the time. As if that’s an excuse to meddle in a police investigation.”

But he’s almost smiling.

 

* * *

 

”You should see him. People _talk_ to him, he says. Just talk, just like that, confessing all their sins. And they’ll do anything he wants, too. Especially the women. All he has to do is smile and he charms any skirt in sight. Got them all wrapped around his finger, he has.”

“Geordie, are you _jealous_?”

“‘Course not. It’s ridiculous, is all, the way no one can resist him.”

“So, what have you been confessing to him, then?”

“Me? Don’t be absurd. You know I don’t go in for all that.”

Cathy smiles, and thinks he must be irresistible indeed.

 

* * *

 

When she finally meets him, Geordie’s vicar, he is incredibly charming. Too charming, almost, as he shows up on their doorstep one evening, unannounced, with a slightly sheepish smile and a gleam in his eye. But she’s heard all about him, so she opens the door and waves aside his apologies for the disturbance.

It’s about the murder, something important and new, and the men huddle in a corner and hatch dangerous sounding plans for tomorrow.

But Sidney smiles at her when he leaves, and thanks her sincerely, and is entirely more charming than should be appropriate.

She likes him.

 

* * *

 

It should bother her more, she thinks, that her husband doesn’t come home after work. That he goes to a pub for a pint, instead of home to his family. But he never brings work home, and if this is how he does it, well, other coppers do far worse. She knows who he’s with and what they’re doing, and it’s not a problem.

Until David’s illness.

Then she needs him, they need him, and he…

It’s Sidney she calls. It’s Sidney who comes. It’s Sidney who finally brings him home. She’s not sure how much that should bother her.

 

* * *

 

It’s absurdly idyllic, a riverside picnic on this warm, sunny day. The grass is green, the birds are chirping, David is sleeping soundly in her arms. The girls are playing badminton and making flower crowns. And Geordie is finally walking again. Slowly, but surely, and with a fierce determination.

And with them are Sidney and his vicarage family, all of whom have been such a help during Geordie’s convalescence. The girls adore Leonard and his infinite patience, and Mrs Maguire has a way of understanding things that sometimes moves Cathy to tears.

It feels like the beginning of something good.

 

* * *

 

Half the trouble is that she doesn’t know what the trouble is. Something’s wrong, very wrong with Geordie, and she doesn’t what or why. It might be his work, all the things it makes him confront and chase. It might be the way he mixes work and friendship, and now friendship and family. Poisoned water seeping over. It might be, but she doesn’t know. He doesn’t talk.

He drinks. He strays. He gets suspended. He gets reinstated. He gets angry and surly and defensive, and still he won’t talk.

He’s fighting with Sidney, and Cathy thinks maybe she envies that.

 

* * *

 

They make up, Geordie and Sidney, of course they do. Their friendship runs too deep for anything else. They need each other too much.

It’s not so easy with him and her. He’s… more himself, if not completely, and though that’s better, some part of her resents it. Resents the fact that he gets that from Sidney, that he’s invested that much of himself somewhere else. Somewhere where she can’t reach him.

He does try to talk, to fix things, but she can’t help but hear echoes of the sermons that surely sent him here.

She wonders what that means.

 

* * *

 

“I kissed Sidney.”

He says it like a confession, eyes closed and face turned away. He says it like a confession, like he expects absolution.

But she’s his wife, not his priest, and she doesn’t need to forgive him.

She needs to breathe. She needs to think. She needs to wrap her mind around what this means.

She needs to know how he expects to make this all right. What he thinks he can say to make this not mean the end.

_’We were drunk’? ‘It was a mistake’? ‘It didn’t mean anything’?_

“I’m not going to do it again.”

 

* * *

 

She corners him in the church after mass.

“You’re not taking him away from us.”

“Cathy…” The look on his face is pure heartbreak. It’s agony and guilt and compassion, and she forces herself to look right through it.

He sighs. “He’s yours. I’m not… You have to know we wouldn’t…”

“You are _not_ taking him away,” she repeats. She won’t let it happen.

“Cathy…” He runs a hand over his face. “It was a mistake. We were stupid. It won’t happen again.”

Everyone always trusts Sidney, that’s his gift. But she know better, this time. He doesn’t trust himself.

 

* * *

 

It’s a silence like weeks-old snow on cobblestones, dense and cold and full of grit, treacherously swallowing up the pits and crags underneath.

No one is talking. Not to her, at least. And whatever Geordie and Sidney may be doing, they aren’t sorting things out. Mrs Maguire calls once a week. Leonard is desperate. Sidney is drinking. And Geordie looks more guilt-wracked every passing day. He snaps at her. He barks at the children.

You don’t tear down a wall because there’s a crack in the plaster, but you don’t plaster over a crumbling wall, either.

It’s time to rebuild.

 

* * *

 

“I don’t care what you do, as long as you come home at the end of the day.”

It’s her rule.

She told Geordie, who didn’t want to hear it, again and again, until he did. She told Sidney, who didn’t believe her, again and again, until he did.

She doesn’t know if this is right. If this can work. But if, to get her Geordie back, she has to share him, she’s willing to try. And she does know that neither of them want to hurt her.

She imagines, but never asks what they do. Geordie always comes home.

 

* * *

 

It’s another picnic on another summer day. The sun is warm, the air calm, and Cathy lies back on their blanket, determined to enjoy the peace for however long it lasts.

The girls have run off with Dickens and Leonard. Sylvia and Jack are doting on David by the water.

On her left, Geordie’s already lightly snoring, letting the sun dry him off. On her right, Sidney stretches out, careful not to drip on her.

“This is good, isn’t it?” he asks, quietly.

“I think so.”

Smiling, he offers her his hand. She takes it.

_And that’s how it begins._

 

**Author's Note:**

> Trillingstar, I loved your prompts, and I hope I did this one justice here!


End file.
